


Good Night Ship, Good Night Coran

by aquatarius



Category: Voltron - Fandom, Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, My First Work in This Fandom, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-18
Updated: 2017-02-18
Packaged: 2018-09-25 06:04:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9806459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aquatarius/pseuds/aquatarius
Summary: Everyone has their demons. Coran too, of course, but he's not going to show that to anyone.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Welp! First time writing anything for Voltron and of course it would be the best character in the Voltron series. It's not real good imo but it's better then I thought it would be! :D Hopefully I'll be writing a lot more for Voltron.

Coran stood on the deck of the ship, staring out at the stars. He looked calm, eyes half closed and hands folded neatly behind his back. Underneath his mustache and facade, emotions swirled erratically. He’d learned that emotions could not always be understood or battled. There were nights when the panic and fear and loneliness that gurgled constantly under his professional yet friendly attitude surged upwards and threatened to overwhelm everything. When that happened, the trick was not to battle them, but to let them run their course. 

 

 He sighed quietly and dug his nails into his palms. He could remember every detail of his last battle, down to the last gun shot. The alarms, the blasts of rifle fire, the clang of swords, and the screams. All that damned  _ screaming _ . He could remember not wanting to go into the pod, most of all. The sharp pain of duty that must be followed as he hid in the pod and allowed the Galra to destroy his world and his people. Because he was  _ valuable _ , and he knew Allura the most, and Alfor had to store himself in the memory banks, and, and, and. He wished every day that he could’ve died in Alfor’s place. 

 

 The door slid open, and Coran half turned. Lance, robed and with his strange Earth mud smeared on his face, blinked at him. He sipped from a blue mug with a very realistic lion face on it. It had been a gift from one of the planets they had recently liberated. Everyone had gotten one. Lance had probably loved his most of all. 

 

 “Hey, Coran. What’re you doing up so late?” Lance asked. His voice was slow and heavy with sleep, and Coran felt a small pang in his heart. Lance should be fast asleep in his Earth bed, with his huge Earth family, not fighting to save the universe. 

 

 “I could ask you the same thing, young man!” Coran chirped, pushing his thoughts to the side as best he could. His voice sounded strange and distant to himself. It didn’t sound like  _ his _ voice. It sounded as alien as the humans or the galra. He smiled and tweaked his mustache anyway. Lance needed the reassurance, and he would be gone soon. 

 

 “I’m just looking for my conditioner. I think Keith stole it, and-” Lance rambled on, sipping occasionally from his cup and Coran stared at him. If he had been asked, he would’ve said that he felt as if there were a layer of cotton between him and the world. Lance paused in his talking and Coran struggled to make himself focus. “-Doing okay? You look like you’re not doing so good, buddy.” 

 

 “I’m fine! Just thinking. I think Hunk took your conditioner. I saw it in the common bath area. Third floor, second hall, seven door on the left. Go on and get it, then straight to bed. Big day tomorrow! We’re settling a disagreement between the Fiilor and the Kiyan and we all need to be well rested in case we need someone to form voltron.” Coran said, letting the words roll of his tongue as if he were an escape pod on auto pilot. They were normal, natural, and didn’t take much thought. 

 

 “Yeah, yeah. Because a bunch of dwarves and tree huggers are going to cause a big fuss.” Lance groaned quietly. 

 

 “You never know. Once, when I was but a youngling, I saw a battle between a group of Talrii and the Lorst of Rii. It was easiest one of the bloodiest battles I ever saw.” It wasn’t, not by far. He could never truthfully say that after the Galra slaughtered his people. Was his voice trembling or was a trick of the near empty deck echoing them back at him? 

 

 “Well, I would love to hear the rest of this story, but-” Lance forced a yawn, and started to back up to the door. “Big day tomorrow, remember? Right, good night, bye!” 

 

 The doors slid shut before Coran could force the words ‘good night’ off them, but he shouted it anyway. The doors weren’t very thick. Lance would hear it. The words bounced back at him, a cacophony of good wishes that chilled him to the bone. He turned back to the stars and stared in the direction of Lance’s Earth. 

 

 What cruel god had determined that Lance, still a child in many ways, would be forced into a role as defender of the galaxy? That same that had forced Allura into being one of the last of her kind? Sweet, firm, fierce, slightly spoiled Princess Allura. He grit his teeth and clenched his fist until he could feel blood. He hated the universe. He wanted to make it take back all the pain it had dished out. 

 

 Time passed, or didn’t pass. Emotions rose and ebbed. Coran held on for dear life. After time, they seemed to start to die down, as they always did. He let out a slow, long breath, and his hands started to relax. 

 

 His fingertips barely brushed his thighs before the door slid open and footsteps echoed in place of voices this time. The gait was too long to be anyone but Hunk or Shiro, and it had a military beat to it that Hunk lacked. 

 

 “Number one! What can I do for you?” 

 

 “I’m looking for the pool. Keith said there was one.” Shiro sounded tired. 

 

 “Righto! Do you think your arm will stand up against the water? I think the hot tub might be better.” 

 

 “You have a hot tub?”

 

 “Yup!”

 

 “You have a hot tub.”

 

 “Indeed we do.” Coran set a hand on the console and then flicked his wrist, drawing up specs of the ship and pointing to the hot tub room, which was directly across from the pool room. 

 

 “An alien hot tub.” Shiro sounded amused. “All right. Thanks, Coran.” 

 

 “You’re welcome, number one.” 

 

 Shiro left the room, and Coran leaned against the console. He flicked it off and closed his eyes.  It was going to be a long night. The entire castle was restless. It seemed to groan like a house and none of the people in it would be allowed a peaceful rest. Perhaps it was nothing, but perhaps the insomnia was catching. 

 

 Perhaps it was Coran’s fault. Perha-

 

 “Coran? What are you  _ doing _ ?” 

 

 Coran jumped nearly a foot into the air, landed lightly on one foot, and spun as he threw a sharp salute. A move that he had perfected in his youth, when his father had caught him up one too many times. 

 

 “Princess Allura! I’m checking the temperatures in the castle. I think it’s a bit chilly tonight.” Coran said. His hand trembled and he very firmly told it that it wasn’t allowed to tremble in front of the princess. 

 

 Allura stared at him, a quizzical expression on her face. Sweat dribbled down the back of Coran’s neck and he gulped. 

 

 “Yes...well...I was wondering if you have seen Shiro. I was going to ask him to accompany me on the mission tomorrow and he’s not in his room.” She was comfortable enough with the human to visit his room? At night? 

 

 “He’s in the hot tub.” Coran said, amusement bubbling up weakly. 

 

 “Will that damage his arm?” 

 “No, no, not at all. He just has to hold it up, erm, like this, see?” Coran held up his right arm and grinned reassuringly at Allura. He could remember when she had been but a wee one, fists curled into her mother’s impressively long locks as they visited the deck for Allura’s first time. It send a sharp pang of nostalgia and regret through his heart. “I’m very sure he wouldn’t mind some company to make sure he remembered to keep his arm up though, mmm _ mmm _ ?” 

 

 Allura blushed in the slightest and Coran gave her the biggest, brightest wink he could manage. Without further ado, she hurried out of the deck and after Shiro. Once he was sure she was gone, Coran allowed his smile to fade, and turned to give one last look at the stars. 

 

 “Well, good night, old girl.” He said, patting the console. “One more day done.”

 

 Coran walked out of the room and headed towards his own. Exhaustion began to settle into his bones, but it was something that reassured him of his returning normalcy. He sighed and entered his room. 

 

 A picture of him, King Alfor, Zarkon, and the other paladins, and Allura in her mother’s arms sat on his nightstand. He picked it up, and stared at it. People he would never see again, bar perhaps Zarkon, people he had loved and who had died while he lived. He closed his eyes as he set it down and laid down on his side. 

 

 He did hate himself, a little bit, for living while they had died. Survivor's Guilt, he supposed. But he knew why it had been needed, and he was flattered that Alfor had shown such trust as to choose  _ him _ as the one to go with Allura. 

  
 Coran would not betray that trust. Not ever. Sleep began to over take him, uneasy and weak, and he let it. Nightmares would be next, as they always were, but perhaps he could get some real sleep before that. Only one way to figure out. 

**Author's Note:**

> Annnd there it is. I am kinda proud of how I managed Coran. I refuse to believe that this man isn't suffering rn. I hope to get better writing him, and everyone else. Maybe check out my writing blog for more future works if you wanna. (http://aquatariuswrites.tumblr.com)


End file.
